"Whenever you're sitting across from some important person, always picture him sitting there in a suit of long red underwear. That's the way I always operated in business"
About this Quote
Power, Kennedy suggests, is mostly stagecraft. The long red underwear isn’t just a gag; it’s a demolition tool aimed at the aura that “important people” cultivate to extract deference. By replacing the polished suit with a ridiculous private garment, he’s performing a mental striptease: pulling status back down to flesh, vanity, and basic human awkwardness. The move is less about disrespect than about refusing hypnosis. Authority depends on your participation in the illusion.
The intent is tactical. Kennedy is describing a negotiator’s hack for asymmetry: if the other person’s title, money, or proximity to power makes you tense, you’ll bargain badly. The underwear trick breaks the spell quickly, returning the encounter to what it actually is: two people trying to get something. It’s also a quiet confession of how he “operated in business” - not as a romantic believer in institutions, but as someone who read rooms, sized up egos, and treated prestige as leverage to be neutralized.
Context sharpens the cynicism. Joseph P. Kennedy rose in a world where access and reputation were currencies, from finance to Hollywood to diplomacy. In that ecosystem, the “important person” is often a performer with better costuming and stronger lighting. The humor is doing real work: it’s a psychological equalizer, but also a moral tell. If you can picture leaders in clownish underwear, you’re less likely to be cowed - and also less likely to be enchanted by their claims to virtue. This is realpolitik in a locker-room key: a reminder that the people steering history are still, unavoidably, human.
The intent is tactical. Kennedy is describing a negotiator’s hack for asymmetry: if the other person’s title, money, or proximity to power makes you tense, you’ll bargain badly. The underwear trick breaks the spell quickly, returning the encounter to what it actually is: two people trying to get something. It’s also a quiet confession of how he “operated in business” - not as a romantic believer in institutions, but as someone who read rooms, sized up egos, and treated prestige as leverage to be neutralized.
Context sharpens the cynicism. Joseph P. Kennedy rose in a world where access and reputation were currencies, from finance to Hollywood to diplomacy. In that ecosystem, the “important person” is often a performer with better costuming and stronger lighting. The humor is doing real work: it’s a psychological equalizer, but also a moral tell. If you can picture leaders in clownish underwear, you’re less likely to be cowed - and also less likely to be enchanted by their claims to virtue. This is realpolitik in a locker-room key: a reminder that the people steering history are still, unavoidably, human.
Quote Details
| Topic | Business |
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